Fathers' Daze
by DSLeo
Summary: Summary: You want kids to pop out of the woodwork? Okay, then! Welcome to Stars Hollow Father's Day! AU, set end S5. For Junienmomo.


Fathers' Daze

Disclaimer: Not mine

Summary: You want kids to pop out of the woodwork? Okay, then! Welcome to Stars Hollow Father's Day! AU, set end S5. For Junienmomo.

Rating: Teen

Genre: Humor/Parody

AN: Because we all need to imagine something too unreal to be our lives.

GG GG GG

"Father's Day," snarled Luke Danes, slapping his cleaning rag along the counter. "A parade for Father's Day. Another artificial holiday invented by money-grabbing corporate stooges to sucker the suckers…"

"You're soooo cute when you rant," sighed Lorelai Gilmore, watching with her chin propped on her hands. "You know that, right? Like, mega-adorable hunky manliness."

Luke shot his girlfriend a quelling glare that, naturally, failed to quell her. "I'm gonna be overrun by men being dragged in here by kids who are gonna pay in twenties they got from their moms, or in _pennies._ "

"Kirk only did that once," Lorelai remarked, sipping her coffee.

With a last smack of the rag on the surgically-sterile counter, Luke growled, "And these poor saps are gonna have to pretend to like ashtrays when they don't even smoke!"

"Don't forget the bad neckties."

Luke rumbled something that might have been, "Bah humbug," or "Bad hamburger." Lorelai didn't ask for clarification. Luke's rants had to run their course, rather like the flu.

Luke stashed the rag and order pad under the register, popped up with a swat of his blue ball cap against his jeans. "And Taylor! He decides to have another town festival! Another one! There was one last week! And one the week before that! And there's one next week! And the Fourth of July, which is at least a real national holiday!"

"Your vein's throbbing," cooed Lorelai, emptying her cup of coffee and setting it carefully by the pot. "C'mon. Let's go attend Taylor's big secret thing-a-whatever."

"You mean his 'surprise'," grumbled Luke, actually succumbing to air quotes. He kissed Lorelai quickly. "You do know I only go to this under protest and because I love you, right?"

"And because I'm wearing my pretty dress," said Lorelai confidently, twirling so fabric flirted out in a wash of summery blue and white. "With the strappy white sandals."

Luke involuntarily glanced at her calves. "Uh. Yeah. Ah geez. Okay, okay. Fine. Can I at least heckle?"

Arm looped through his, Lorelai confided archly, "Babe, it's Taylor. If we don't heckle, there's no _point_."

GG GG GG

"So what's the deal with the invites?" asked Rory, lounging on a picnic blanket provided by Logan. Luke sat as if the plaid would contaminate him, but Lorelai curled gracefully down, snatching a bit of cheese from a plate. She handed Luke a grape.

"This is really nice of you, Logan, thank you," said Lorelai politely. Luke nudged her, with one of those _looks_. Lorelai swallowed her dislike of Logan enough to find a sincere, "The food looks fantastic."

"Hey, only the best for Ace," shrugged Logan, yawning behind his hand. "So. Invitations? To stand up there with Taylor Doose? Who could possibly refuse?"

"Well, we knew Kirk wouldn't," remarked Lorelai as Kirk Gleason sat in a folding chair indicated by Taylor. The gazebo generally sufficed, but today, Taylor had permitted a stage.

Frowning, Luke sat up straighter, arm sliding from around Lorelai's shoulders. "Isn't that... Is that Michel?"

Lorelai dropped a cracker in her lap. Luckily, a napkin already lay across it. "Michel? My Michel?"

Sure enough, the fashionably clad manager of the Dragonfly Inn sat on one of the folding chairs, after having carefully dusted it with a handkerchief.

"I have a bad feeling about this," said Luke softly.

For once, Lorelai quipped appropriately. "That's no moon."

"Nope," agreed Luke, and settled back on the blanket. He murmured in her ear, "We owe him. He talked her out of grand theft yacht. Be nice."

"Me?" hissed Lorelai in Luke's ear, causing a shiver to go down his spine. "You didn't even say hello!"

Caught, Luke leaned around and said, "Oh yeah. Hey, Logan."

"Hey, Luke."

Rory watched this with a puzzled frown, before pointing out, "Hey, that's Dad!"

"I hate Taylor," said Luke wearily and lay flat, cap over his face. "Wake me when it's time to re-open the diner."

"Spoilsport."

"You can heckle Taylor alone."

"Huh," was Lorelai's reply, and she waved cheerfully to Michel, though not to Chris Hayden. She leaned over. "Rory? Isn't that your sixth-grade science teacher? The one who said bananas are bad for women because they make them masculine?"

Rory's head shot up from a pudding cup. "Mr. Fogarty? Yeah, he said cucumbers did that, too. Oh, and…"

"Okay, yeah, I think we get the idea," interrupted Logan hastily, and passed Lorelai a pudding cup to go with her cheese and crackers. Unlike Luke, who cracked open an eye and moaned, "Oh geez, that's killing you, you know that?", Logan simply handed Lorelai a spoon.

Disgruntled, Lorelai had to admit the kid did keep her kid from stealing a yacht. He had _some_ merits. And pudding cups. She sighed. This was not a fun picnic. Taylor was taking forever, Luke was sulking or sleeping, and Rory was texting someone. Pouting, she kicked off her shoes and looked for Miss Patty. There had been a promise of punch. Much punch. Not the infamous Founders' Day punch, which could punch someone into next week, but still, any punch brewed by Miss Patty neutered Taylor's capacity to annoy the drinker.

"All right, everyone, pay attention! It's the Father's Day Stars Hollow Surprise!"

Kirk squealed, "You found my father?"

Eyes cast to heaven, Taylor replied, "No, Kirk."

Kirk slumped.

Chris cracked a joke of some kind. Michel rolled his eyes and turned away. Mr. Fogarty of the phallic vegetable fetish stared at his pinstriped trousers. The fourth of the lucky men to be invited to the stage looked familiar to Lorelai, but neither she nor Rory could place him. Tired of their low-voiced bickering (or the fact Lorelai insisted the man resembled a hot young Robert Redford, with Rory arguing he looked like a hot young Brad Pitt who bathed), Luke sat up, took a glance, and shrugged. "Eh. Mrs. Cassini's nephew Paul. We played baseball together. And he's not blond."

"Thanks for ruining the dream," sighed Lorelai melodramatically.

"Oooh, is his hair really dark? He'd be even hotter if his hair was dark," gushed Rory, craning her neck for a longer and somewhat more predatory examination of the man in question.

"And, ahem, Ace, you have a boyfriend, remember?" grumbled Logan, mock-grimacing. "Thought girls prefer blonds?"

"Meh," dismissed Rory. "Hey, Luke? Think he's into younger women?"

That earned Rory three identical expressions of outrage.

She threw up her hands. "Sheesh. I was kidding. But he does look sorta like someone I know."

"Look," said Luke impatiently, "he's dyed his hair for years, he got beaned on the head with a ball, he needed stitches, the hair along there grew back lighter than the rest, so people called him Skunk, okay? Happy now you have his whole sordid _private_ information to play with?"

"Geez, who put real milk in your granola?" sniffed Lorelai. "Ooh, looks like Taylor's finally ready to start!"

"Please," begged Luke of the heavens, and sat up with a snort of contempt for the candy-striped suit worn by his least favorite neighbor.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" boomed Taylor through a bullhorn. "We have a Father's Day _spectacular_! _Stupendous_! _Surprise_! For these fine young men here on the stage with me!"

"I can't tell," whispered Lorelai to Luke. "Is he going for PT Barnum or Cryptkeeper?"

"He's going for more ridiculous than he already is."

Lorelai subsided.

"And what a Father's Day surprise it is! Now, we all know that fathers play a valuable role in a child's life. A father is a kind, nurturing disciplinarian, an imparter of ethics and values, a bestower of wisdom and earthly goods…"

Luke yelled, "Get to the point!"

"Yeah!" Lorelai echoed for the sake of solidarity.

"Oh fine, fine, ruin the fun," snarled Taylor. "Very well. Christopher Hayden, please stand up and come to the front."

Chris did, a puzzled and empty-headed smile on his face.

"We all know you have a lovely pair of daughters. That other one," was Taylor's description of GG, "and our own lovely Rory Gilmore!"

The town clapped. It was a way to shut up Taylor, after all.

"But did you know you have a _son_?"

The blood drained out of many faces. Luke whipped around, glowering at Lorelai, who shook her head. Rory stared at her father with her mouth open, and biscotti still en route to it. Christopher himself looked what could only be called stone cold busted.

"Happy Father's Day, Mr. Hayden, on behalf of Stars Hollow, and your son… Tristan Dugray!"

The biscotti fell to the ground. Luke's forehead tangled. "Didn't Rory know a…"

Lorelai's hand clenched on his hard enough to whiten his fingertips. "Shh!"

Luke shushed as a tall, good-looking Logan-esque sort of young man came onto the stage and handed Chris Hayden a folder.

"But he's my age," whispered Rory. "He even tried to… Oh my God. My half-brother? He's my half-brother? He tried to date me!" Her voice started to crack. "Mom?"

"That son of a…" Lorelai began on behalf of her betrayed teen self, then recoiled further. "Oh, ew, the Dugrays, she was _older_! By… Oh… Oh my God, this is…"

Chris stammered something. Tristan replied. Chris yelled, "Lore, I'm sorry, it was just…"

Tristan Dugray had vanished to military school. Presumably, they'd taught him some military moves. A single strike from his fist, a bitter, "And that's for ruining my life because my parents hated me because of you!" and that was the end of that. Or at least of Tristan, who stalked away with his head high. Chris staggered in his wake, head much lower, to staunch the bleeding of his nose.

Red-cheeked, Taylor stammered, "Ah, yes, um, well, that… It's a shock, but it's a happy shock!"

Luke was cradling Lorelai to him, staring lethally at Taylor. "It's okay, I'm here."

"I need a shower. In my _brain_!" wailed Lorelai into his flannel-clad shoulder.

"Mom, he tried to date me!"

Lorelai blindly extended an arm and Rory cuddled close to her, Logan fluttering uselessly with offers of chocolate and paper napkins. Luke quietly sneered in contempt. Anyone who knew the Gilmores knew it was coffee they needed. He tossed the Huntzberger heir his keys, said, "Touch anything but the coffee, you'll wish you died," and returned to soothing his girls by sitting like a rock. Fortunately, all they required at the moment was something to lean on, and so he could get away with it.

"I do not have a son," declared Michel, "nor a daughter. I do not consort with women of such low character as to not inform a man of such things. You are too stupid. I am leaving."

Michel marched away, stopping cold when he saw a boy of perhaps five wearing a tailored button-down shirt and linen trousers. He glared at the woman. "I do not remember you."

"Donor number six eight two two four one nine," she supplied helpfully. "His name is Peter but he insists I call him Pierre, and he loves Celine Dion. Did he get that from you?"

Michel reached down, hugged the small boy and caroled, " _Mon fils!_ "

"And now _my_ brain needs a shower," sighed Luke into Lorelai's curls. "Somebody wake me up and tell me this isn't happening."

Logan arrived, panting, and shoved to-go cups of coffee at the Gilmores. He passed a beer to Luke, explaining quickly, "From the limo, don't worry, I didn't touch anything but the coffee!"

"Good," snorted Luke, and twisted the cap off the beer.

"So two down, two to go. Oh boy."

"Well, really, it's three," said Babette, appearing from nowhere as she often did. Her voice softened from screech to scratch. "Kirk, Mr. Fogarty, and Paul Cassini!"

"Maybe," pondered Logan as Babette scurried to the next picnic blanket to impart the gossip of the moment, "I should've gotten the whiskey."

"Mmpflz," said Lorelai from Luke's shoulder, which might have been, "Yes, please," or "Muffins, please." Nobody asked her to clarify since Paul Cassini was being introduced to his biological son…

"Dean?!" squalled Lorelai and Rory together.

"Well, that explains a lot," said Luke, but did not elucidate until Lorelai elbowed him. "Hey! Ow! Guy could fall asleep standing in left field, it's how he got beaned in the skull in the first place."

Lorelai hooted in triumph. "I _knew_ Dean was a narcoleptic!"

"Mom! This means Dean's mom cheated on him! She committed adultery!"

There was a very significant silence.

Rory reddened and shrank. "Oh. Right. Pot calling kettle. Got it. Never mind. Shutting up now."

"Please," said Logan unhappily and took a swig from the beer when Luke offered. "My therapist is going to have a field day with this."

"Oooh," squealed Lorelai to her daughter. "Hon, who's gonna get stuck with Mr. Fogarty?!"

The silence in the square, as that realization occurred to others, could have broken the sound barrier from the other direction. It was downright _quantum_.

Everyone exhaled when it turned out that Mr. Fogarty had contributed the DNA that gave the world Hep Alien bassist and man-of-many-ailments Brian Fuller. The two bespectacled men stared each other down before asking simultaneously, "Do you have an inhaler?"

"Okay, that was creepy," said Lorelai, and took a long, shuddering breath. She also drank some coffee. "Okay. Well, that leaves Kirk. Do you think Taylor did find Mr. Gleason? After all?"

Even Logan could share in the horrified communal dread at _that_ prospect.

"Finally, Kirk Gleason…"

Kirk leapt up, shouting, "Lulu! I swear! Only you!"

Lulu called back, "I believe you, sweet-knees!"

A universal sense of gagging swept across the town square.

"You have a daughter, Kirk!"

Kirk fell into his chair. A dark-haired duo approached.

Luke leaned forward. "Wait. That looks like Anna Nardini."

"She has a cute boutique," commented Lorelai, "but she charges too much. No way that bunny baby pillow was worth twenty-five bucks."

"Bunny baby pillow?" asked three voices at once.

"Yeah. Y'know. Pillow," described Lorelai, using her hands, "shaped like a rabbit? Supposed to help babies sleep? What, I was shopping for Sookie's shower!"

"Oh," said three voices, and Luke's was by far the most relieved.

"I dated her for a while, once, around the time I opened the diner," commented Luke, causing Lorelai to narrow her eyes and fix Miss Nardini with an incinerating stare. "I dunno, she seemed nice, but she told me she slept with someone else at a party, so..." Luke's shrug told the rest of the story. It was a very short story.

"You sure get cheated on a lot," said Lorelai thoughtfully. "Something I need to know?"

Realizing belatedly the quicksand he'd metaphorically stepped into, Luke quickly replied, "I was waiting for you," and earned a kiss.

Logan offered a fist-bump. "Nice save, man."

"Kirk, your daughter's name is April. April, come meet your father!"

A girl of perhaps eleven or twelve looked at Kirk. Her eyeglasses hid part of her expression but she turned and cried out, "Mom?"

"He looked much better drunk," said Anna Nardini feebly.

"Oh, _ouch_ ," muttered Logan, shaking his head. "You got cheated on with _Kirk_."

"Not helping," snapped Rory. "Go get alcohol, you're good at that!"

Logan obeyed. Lorelai shook Luke. "Hey. Take a look."

Kirk was staring white-faced at the girl. At the woman. Then he screamed, turned, and ran. "Lulu, honey-cheeks! I'm sorrrrrry!"

There was a loud bang, and a quiver, and a soft thump.

"Tell me he didn't kill the diner," groaned Luke, not looking.

Unable to resist, Lorelai peeped. "Nope. Knocked himself out running into the door."

The town square was quiet. Somewhere, in their midst, a cricket quietly and insolently chirped.

Taylor cleared his throat. "I suppose this is a good time to mention the ice cream stand is open?"

For once, ice cream could not lure Lorelai. She kissed Luke's temple, asking softly, "You okay?"

"Oh, yeah, sure, I'm great," Luke said in a monotone. "I got cheated on, bad enough, right, but no, it was with Kirk. _Kirk_. Do you realize that could've been _my_ kid? And this is how I would've found out?"

"No secrets in Stars Hollow," Lorelai said weakly, and then smiled with hard determination. "C'mon, let's go re-open the diner and give Kirk some toast."

"Yeah. Toast. Poor kid," added Luke, casting a single lingering glance of pity at the unfortunate April Nardini. "All the people in the world, and she gets Kirk for a father." He stood, pulling Lorelai up with him. "You think he and Lulu can get through it?"

"I think we should worry more about the fact Kirk has reproduced."

Luke shuddered. "Gah. Yeah. All right, crazy lady, let's re-open the diner."

They'd barely reached the sidewalk when Luke asked, "Where'd Kirk go?"

A blur ran past them, screaming. "Mooootheerrrrrr!"

Chasing after it came another blur, sobbing, "Kirk! Sweet-knees, come back!"

After a thoughtful pause, Luke said, "I'm opening the diner. I'm pretending this didn't happen. You?"

Wide-eyed, Lorelai said, "Hey, if it means I can forget Kirk reproduced? I'm with ya." She punched the air. "Amnesia ahoy!"

Luke captured the hand as it dropped. "No. Tequila."

"Who said anything about tequila?" purred Lorelai, and Luke did _not_ re-open the diner.

GG GG GG

AN: Absurdity is my idea of the spice of life.


End file.
